“As you walk by, the images change…

… but the sculpture has no moving parts: it just sits there. Best illusion I’ve ever seen”

- Dan Fairchild, Vancouver Biennale Photographer -

Doors of Knowledge in beautiful Minoru Park

Patrick Hughes is a British artist working in London. He is the creator of “reverspective”, an optical illusion on a 3-dimensional surface where the parts of the picture which seem farthest away are actually physically the nearest.

Doors on one side

Since he was a young boy, Patrick Hughes has had a fascination with illusionism and reverse-perspective. It sprung from the experiences he had in his childhood. During the World War II air raids, he would hide under the stairs of his home with his mother and here, in the reversed image of the staircase, he saw his future work take shape. “Here were stairs, but you couldn’t climb them” he said in an interview just last month.

(Click here for full interview with Jody Wilson: http://wonderboygraphics.com/20-questions/patrickhughes/)

Books on the other side

The Vancouver Biennale has placed one of Patrick’s reverspective sculptures in Richmond’s Minoru Park. It is really important to go and see it in person so you can walk backwards and forwards in front of it and see the images changing and moving before your eyes, all while you stay still!

Studying up close

Right now, Patrick Hughes is busy painting a Mosque as well as visions of Venice but he was kind enough to take some time away from his busy schedule to answer some questions that we asked him:

Patrick Hughes

- What or who is your artistic inspiration?

My inspiration is to create something that will live after I have gone

 - What made you want to become an artist?

 I wanted to be a writer of paradoxical prose but I thought that there were several expert practitioners, So I decided to become the first paradoxical painter. 

 - How long did it take for you to make ‘Doors of Knowledge’?

 Twenty years to work out reverspective, five years to incorporate forced perspective with reverspective and two or three months to have the sculpture made 

   - How long does it take you to complete a work of art?

 It usually takes about six weeks from making the wooden shape, doing the drawing on the computer, to painting it. 

 - Can you describe the process of making art?

 First of all one has to think of an idea. They can come to you unbidden on a journey, but they are the result of hard work in my sketchbook, wondering and day-dreaming – with a purpose 

 - Do your sculptures evolve as you are creating them?

 No 

 - What would you say has been your greatest artistic achievement?

 My greatest achievement has been to invent reverspective

It was one last blast of sunshine and warm weather – a perfect weekend for late-September.

The clear and sunny skies brought people out into the parks of Vancouver and thousands of people had a little fun on their way to English Bay with Yue Minjun’s hugely popular A-Mazing Laughter installation.

Intrepid photographer Dan Fairchild caught some of the action with his camera.  Looks like everybody was having a good time.

Getting a little fresh with the artwork!  Photo by Dan Fairchild.

Yue Minjun uses his own iconic face in a state of hysterical laughter as a signature trademark. Recognized universally as a sign of happiness, the smile raises questions of intent and interpretation. One of the most influential contemporary artists in China, Yue Minjun represents the new wave of Chinese artistic freedom.

A-Mazing Laughter marks Yue Minjun’s Canadian debut.

Faces are flowers soaking up the sun.  Photo by Dan Fairchild.

In A-Mazing Laughter Beijing-based artist Yue Minjun depicts his own iconic laughing image, with gaping grins and closed eyes in a state of hysterical laughter.  These laughing figures are the signature trademark of the artist. They are not a conventional self-portrait, as they tell us little about the person portrayed or of the reason they are laughing so hysterically.

The longer you look at these cast bronze figures, the more the contradiction of the silent, frozen form of sculpture begins to intrude.  We see, but do not hear the laughter.  The contorted poses of the figure suggest animation and a cartoon form of an anonymous person. The laughter appears to be convulsive, intense, and manic, but also insincere and forced.

The scale is “un-naturally” large –exaggerated and excessive like the laughter.

The poses are infectious.  Photo by Dan Fairchild.

Yue Minjun was a leading figure in what became to be known in the 1990’s as Cynical Realism, an artistic movement that emerged in China after the 1989 student demonstrations in Tiananmen and the suppression of artistic expression.  Humor, cynicism, repetition and an emphasis on the individual are common characteristics of this artistic movement.

Yue Minjun was one of the first artists to translate this new ironic view of contemporary life, one that is expressed in the nihilistic hilarity at a time when little was funny.

You gotta keep your head up around these guys.  Photo by Dan Fairchild.

For more information about Yue Minjun’s incredible work please visit www.yueminjun.com.

For more information about Dan Fairchild’s great camera work please check out his Flickr Photostream.

Swallowing golden light at sunset. Photo by Sean Cranbury.

A truck full of long wooden boxes and a crane showed up in the early morning hours at Morton Triangle near English Bay to unload a precious cargo.

The cargo, still cocooned in clear plastic wrap, was Yue Minjun’s figurative sculpture A-Mazing Laughter.  14 figures – each standing roughly 8′ high – sculpted in 7 different, evocative positions.  With more teeth than ever thought possible & squinting eyes, the figures are bent forward, leaning back, making funny gestures with their hands.

Are they laughing, are they playing?  Or is something else happening here?  What’s behind that smile?  Is it a smile, is it something else?

And who pays for the dental work?

The installation site from up above.  Photo by Dan Fairchild.

The theme for Phase One of the Vancouver Biennale is “In-transit-ion”

To kick off “In-transit-ion” is the arrival of “A-Mazing Laughter” by artist Yue Minjun (China). The installation will take place on Monday September 21, 2009 at Morton Triangle located at English Bay between Denman and Davie Streets. The Vancouver Biennale has also chosen this location, in and amongst this incredible sculpture installation, as the site for the official launch on October 27, 2009, where media, sponsors and friends will gather for a ribbon cutting ceremony and sculpture tour.

Still wrapped tight, the sculpture waits for freedom.  Photo Dan Fairchild.

“A-Mazing Laughter” consists of multiple figures depicting the artist’s own iconic laughing image, all with gaping grin and closed eyes in a state of hysterical laughter. The longer you look at the cast bronze figures, the more evident the contradiction between the animated laughter and the silent, frozen form of sculpture. It is cartoon like and playful, yet curious and intense.

Looks like some sort of jamboree is about to erupt.  Photo by Dan Fairchild.

The Vancouver Biennale brings sculptures, new media and performance works by celebrated and emerging international artists to Vancouver and surrounding area parks, beaches and urban plazas, transforming our city into an open-air museum. Pursuing the theme “In-transit-ion”, the exhibition is situated along bike routes, on buses, at the Vancouver International Airport and at new Canada Line rapid transit stations.

Infectious laughter.  Photo by Dan Fairchild.

Elegant, enigmatic Barbora has alighted on Thronton Park across from the famous and stately Pacific Central Station near the intersection of Terminal Avenue and Main Streets in midtown Vancouver.

Crafted by revered Lithuanian sculptor, photographer and social activist, Vladas Vildžiūnas, Barbora stands at about 12′ tall.  She’s made from textured stainless steel and these photos are from a series that I helped to shoot with master photographer Dan Fairchild just after dusk last Saturday evening.  Dan does such great work.

Vladas has created some of the most influential and important monumental works in Lithuania to date.   Titled Honored Artist of Lithuania in 1982, his work has since been exhibited in New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, London and many major cities around Europe.  The 2009-2011 Vancouver Biennale will be his first foray in Canada.

The first two photos show Barbora from the back as though she were gathering together her gowns before proceeding across the road to a waiting coach.

The bottom photo looks up at her as she glances to her right.  What is she looking at or for?

Light was fading during the shoot and Dan began taking 15-second shots of the work, lighting it by a variety of flashlights and colored gels.

We are expecting to do several more shoots of Barbora during different times of the year to catch her in as many different lights as possible.

I look forward to seeing her during the ‘magic hour’ of a mid-September evening or witnessing her moodiness on a November afternoon. I’m especially excited about capturing how she reflects the brittle winter air of a February dawn.  I imagine the mountains covered in snow and the sky clear blue with diminishing hints of rose. The quiet city stretching out, slowly shaking itself awake, sipping its morning coffee in a bathrobe.

And Barbora… enchanting, resilient, eternal.

Below is a front shot of Barbora with the sky behind her that awesome magnetic blue.

Michael Zheng‘s The STOP has been installed in two locations in Vancouver to kick off the 2009-2011 edition of the Vancouver Biennale!  These arresting and thought-provoking pieces can be found in Charleston Park and Vanier Park and have already attracted lots of photographers and commentary from people passing by.

Michael Zheng was on-hand for the installs to ensure that they projected his vision and worked with the landscape to maximum effect.  Michael is a globetrotting artist who splits his time between San Francisco and Beijing.  He has exhibited internationally including the The Instituto Valenciano de Arte Moderno, Spain, the ERNST Museum in Budapest, Hungary, the F2 Gallery in Beijing, China, Walter and McBean Galleries of San Francisco Art Institute, Künstlerverein Malkasten, Düsseldorf, Germany, and the International Video-Performance Festival, Tallinn, Estonia to name just a few.

Michael and all of us at the Vancouver Biennale would like to acknowledge the generous support of Rob Slarks and everyone at Ocean Concrete for their generous donation of the concrete for both of the installations.  Their kind sponsorship goes a long way to helping Vancouver residents and tourists enjoy and experience public art in our beautiful city.

We look forward to publishing an interview with Michael soon and look forward to hearing and seeing the public responses to Michael’s work in the coming weeks.

Thanks Michael!  What a great way to start/STOP the Vancouver Biennale.

Top photo by Michael Zheng.  All others by Dan Fairchild Photography.